“That fabric just hangs on your hips and stops dead, you’re going to look shrink wrapped from your ribs down.” My client Denise accused me of doing as we stood in her studio at lunchtime today as she barely paused between kettlebell swings to make her argument. I’d stupidly tried to mention I’d picked up a bodycon dress for a wedding on holiday months ago and this was her well rehearsed response. Denise is pear shaped herself, torched by exactly that same silhouette twice in her life time. She wasn’t criticizing me she was just stating cold hard facts about a style she’d tried and spectacularly failed at.
I went home after our session determined to wear it out of spite just so she was wrong about it, which is pretty much how I end up holding all my strongest opinions on clothing usually.
Except she’s only half right. And that other half couldn’t be more wrong. It took me wearing it through a whole day, waiting until after the spin class bit to properly judge it, to figure out which was which.
Everyone wants the easy verdict here, full fat yes or no and I can’t give you that because trying on bodycons split neatly into two arguments for me; ones that have almost nothing to do with each other. There’s the case of what the fabric is actually doing to your shape. Then there’s what happens when you actually stop posing sci-fi heroines in it and start living your life wearing it. Look at them both as a single question and you’ll answer it incorrectly.
The fabric decides if it flatters you or just outlines you.
Issue numero uno, Denise is totally right about but it wasn’t the bodycon dress I was testing it was specifically a bodycon dress made out of that super thin one layer stretch fabric with zero structural integrity to it. That stuff doesn’t contour anything it just records. No matter how you look in zero layer nylon it’s going to cling truthfully to every.single Inch of you and hip to thigh on a pear shape with minimal waist there is a huge amount of ground to cover. That type of dress will just highlight every single area it has to cover instead of smoothing things over. Truthful doesn’t equate to flattering when you’re looking at almost a quarter naked on your bottom half.
I’ve got that exact thing in my wardrobe right now. Cheap as chips, ribbed jersey, thirty seconds to decide I hated it in a changing room that hypnotized me type of deal, and by three hours into a birthday dinner out it had rolled up, bunched at the hip seam and had me looking like I’d drunk too many gin and tonics and been poured into my dress and left to set.
Real texture makes the difference. Everything I tried on that had more compression through the middle layer than just ‘being stretchy’ got rid of that effect. Double layer scuba, ponte with actual weight. The sorts of fabrics that don’t just sit on your hips they control the line and smooth the transition from waist to hip instead of publicly archiving it. I had a friend’s engagement party last month and one of these moved with me. Sat down, stood up, survived a whole frantic grocery shopping trip while wearing heels and yes, even one stupid dance to a song I hate. It stayed put because it had something to cling to besides my skin and that’s the difference between clingfilm and fabric that wants to actually be a dress.
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Added bonus, the better fabrics actually respect the waist because they have one built in. Most pear shapes have a natural waist we can work with and if your bodycon has a seam or panel that hits that instead of skipping straight over it to the hips it will automatically soften that drop instead of leaving all the work to your hip.
Skip that seam entirely and go one stretch panel that hits you high waist to thigh and the dress is fighting you. No eye catching detail to soften the drop and the widest part of your lower half has to do all the visual heavy lifting. Minor thing to notice in the grand scheme of dresses I know? Only one that matters when it comes to making or breaking bodycons.
What happens once you start moving around in it, not just melting sexily
Ok I am totally disagreeing with Denise here. Her entire argument was based on how it looks when you first pull it over your head and put it on. Mine is very much about how it feels when you wear it around for hours on end. Which is fair, when you buy a clingy dress that’s pretty much the point of it. The snag for pear shapes, or anyone with their widest bit below their waist, is that when those garments ride up, and they will pretty much all ride up at some point unless we extend them past the knee, its right on that hip area. All your movement rises and falls right there.
I attended a work dinner in one last September that stayed perfect until we sat down to a three course meal and wouldn’t you know it…it had rolled up two whole inches in the small of my back. Not the look I was going for ten feet from the boss. That also happens if you get in and out of cars lots, or god forbid taxis, lots. Basically any time you find yourself sitting down unexpectedly.
Length is far more important than fabric on this front honestly.
Get it to at least knee skim level and you suddenly have enough wiggle room to actually take a step without your dress pulling against your hip OR having to worry about grazing the floor every time you bend over to tie your shoe. Drop it down mid thigh and suddenly it’s all about whether your fabric is actually heavy enough or textured enough to hang onto your hips all night regardless of what you end up doing in it. Trust me, and the cheap dress above, some can, some most absolutely cannot.
So how does that answer wear yes or no? I actually think, provided we address that fabric and length issues above, bodycons do work for pear shapes. Not in spite of our hip to waist ratio but because of it. Everything I mentioned there allows us to own that lower half curve in all its glory. Tell me yes or no to wearing a bodysuit top with that same skirt though and we’re talking about a whole different animal of shape. Something I’m convinced Denise and I will both agree on.
